We are excited to report that on Oct. 30, 2009 Energy Secretary Stephen Chu  announced that a coalition of 40 state geological surveys headed up by the Arizona Geological Survey has been selected to populate the new National Geothermal Data System with relevant state-specific geothermal data by deploying the Geoscience Information Network nationwide.

The Secretary announced awards totaling $338 million for geothermal energy across the country. The AZGS-led project (section 5 in the list) will negotiate to receive $15.7 million over 3 years. AZGS is acting on behalf of the Association of American State Geologists (AASG - www.stategeologists.org).

AZGS is already a partner in the Geothermal Data Coalition, based at Boise State University to design and build the National Geothermal Data System under contract to DOE. AZGS will adapt the Geoscience Information Network (GIN - www.usgin.org) to provide data discovery, access, and exchange services as a component in the developing data system. Other components include a data repository, software applications, vocabularies, data content, network communications, and web portals.

GIN is a collaboration between AASG and the U.S. Geological Survey to integrate geological survey data bases using web services and open source standards in a distributed system.  The service architecture being developed by the USGIN project will be the foundation for the data system.